


Enough

by hanyou_elf



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Angst, Child Abuse, M/M, Rape
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-31
Updated: 2011-12-31
Packaged: 2017-10-28 13:20:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/308270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hanyou_elf/pseuds/hanyou_elf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Maybe I should give up and suffer in silence?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Enough

_Es un inmenso vacio, ya no hay amor aqui.  Talvez me debo rendir y sufrir en silencio? ~’Silencio,’ Nelly Furtado y Josh Groban   (It’s an immense emptiness, there is no love here.  Maybe I should give up and suffer in silence?)_

It is raining the night Spencer Reid shows up on your porch.  Not just any kind of raining either: it's pouring buckets of ice cold rain.  His hair is plastered to his side in straight clumps; nothing of that soft wave he wears so naturally.  He hasn't bothered with the contacts he's learned to wear daily, to help make him look older.  He looks like the kid he'd been years ago.

''Kid,'' you murmur softly, unable to help yourself.  He looks at you through eyes that are wide and wet, and not just from the rain.  ''What's up, kid?''

''You're not yourself,'' he answers as he crosses his long arms over his chest. 

''What're you talkin' about?''

''Since we got back from Chicago, you've been different.  I mean, I understand.  You don't have to explain yourself to me, just, don't shut yourself off either,'' Spencer smiles nervously.

''Reid,'' you start.  He deserves more, he deserves _intimacy_ , because you were close before.  Close enough to consider yourselves in the fledgling beginnings of a relationship.  Boyfriends, almost.

''Derek,'' he interrupts.  ''I liked what we had.  And I don't want this to ruin that chance.  So be honest with me.''

You're constantly amazed at this skinny kid, your closest friend within the BAU.  He's been there from the first day he started in the BAU, since he worked his way past the jock issues he's had with you in the past.

But you're terrified he might hurt you; or in some twisted reality, that you might hurt him.  You know where you fall short, where you just aren't strong enough to be with him.  ''Spencer,'' you try again.  He doesn't interrupt you this time, instead, he crosses his long arms over his chest again and waits patiently.  ''I don't want to hurt you,'' you finally admit.

''You won't,'' he says.  And before you can respond or even react, he's wrapped you in his embrace.  Long limbs, skinny body, careful touches. 

He's so good for you, but you can't risk this.  You can't taint him.  And yet, you can't help yourself.  You lean heavily against him, pulling him deeper into the small home you own, risking going further than you've gone with him before.

''I love you,'' he whispers against your ear, and you shiver in pleasure and excitement.  This is both terrifying and exciting at the same time.  Before you can respond- stupidly saying thank you is the only thing on your tongue- his lips meet yours.

You hold him close to your body.  Your arms wrap painfully tight around his slender frame, and you know he can feel your heart racing in your chest.  You might be imagining it, but you think you can feel his heart beating too.  He clings to you, his arms are wound around your back, his hands are fisted in the back of your shirt.  He's holding you up, more than you would have ever believed he could.

It is amazing how desperately you want to just let go with him.

''Come in,'' you whisper against his shoulder, knowing exactly where this is going.  You know how far he'll push, and you'll let him push you all the way.  You need this; he needs this.  You've pushed him away far enough this week, and it's time to make it up to him.

You need the healing this will bring; he needs the confidence of knowing your trust is in him.

You make quick work of offering him a cold beer, some cold pizza, and the entertainment of MMA fighting.  After football, it is the most interesting sport, in your opinion.  You appreciate the creativity of their fighting styles, of their body manipulation.  And before he interrupted you, this was your evening plan.  Until you went to the gym to wear yourself out through physical exertion.

''Derek,'' he asks softly, facing you with those long legs curled beneath him.  He looks so young with the bottle of beer in his hand.  He looks good against the black leather of your modern and sophisticated couch- staple of an intelligent bachelor.  ''Derek, I'm worried about you.''

''Pretty boy,'' you murmur, stroking your hand over his.  You don't know how to handle this.  Buford was a topic you would have eventually gotten around to talking about with him, and you know that there's a chance to play it all off right now, to pretend that you're not a victim of child molestation, of abuse. 

''Tell me what happened,'' he encourages.  His voice is soft and conciliatory.  There's no judgment in his voice, no painful clue or insinuation that he thinks you’re damaged goods.  Instead, there is only the need to know and to understand; example of who Spencer is as a person.

''I was twelve, and I had just gotten in trouble again for running and Buford was at juvie,” you answer softly.  You lick your lips and look away from him, refusing to look when you tell him that you’ve been molested.  “He wanted me to be more involved in my community.  Thought it would be a good idea for me to do my punishment in the Youth center.  He was right, it was the best thing, but it…”

“You don’t have to go through the details,” Spencer murmurs softly.  “Just trust me enough to tell me about it.”

“You already know what happened,” you protest, knowing that there wasn’t any chance in hell that the team of elite profilers that he worked with would know nothing.  Not after his behavior in Chicago.  He’d done it to himself, he’d given his own secret up.

“I  know what happened because of a case that we worked.  I don’t know what happened to you personally.  I can infer but that doesn’t mean much when the man it affected won’t confirm or deny.  Derek, trust me with your secrets here.  Trust me like you have to know you can.  Especially if we’re going to be more than just friends.”

It’s a pretty speech, and you can’t believe it has taken this awkward genius to make you understand.  You’re not invulnerable.  You never have been. 

You can’t beat these secrets and lies alone.  You were never capable of that. 

You haven’t let your past go, haven’t forgiven the pain of it all yet.  You’re damn good at pushing it behind you though.

Spencer deserves your honesty though.  Your trust and your truth.  He wants more from you than just your body, he’s not going to hurt you.  He would have sought to take advantage of you by now.  He wouldn’t be desperately seeking more of your trust, your faith, your comfort.  He would want to hurt you.  And you would have let him, because you have faith in him.  You trust this skinny man with all of your heart, with all of your mind.  And the frightening thing is that you wouldn’t trade anything in the world for the fear that Spencer inspires in you, for the closeness that he demands.  The apathy before him was too easy and far too hard.  And you can’t fall into that again.

How do you explain to some awkward twenty-something that he’s the reason you’re striving so hard?  How do you tell a man-child that his love for you is the only thing keeping you going sometimes?  That you have so much anger and hatred and resentment for men in general, but he inspires so much more: Hope.  Love.  Trust.

“I didn’t know what was happening the first time he touched me,” you whisper, clutching his long hand in yours.  The contrast is amazing, and you love that he’s so pale- so pure.  “I couldn’t fight, because he was the one that kept me out of juvie again.  He was teaching me responsibility so I could get out.  He didn’t… didn’t do…”  You gesture helplessly, watching his hand in yours.  How do you say _‘he only made me blow him’_ without sounding crass and hurt?

Spencer’s eyes are comforting, compassionate.  He sits the beer down and looks at you expectantly, knowing that you’ll continue.  Knowing that you know you can trust him.  He licks his lips and tightens his hand in yours, hopefully reassuring you- you can see it in his dark eyes. 

“He’d gotten me out of juvie the year before he touched me.  And it was at the youth center.  It seemed important to him that we do it someplace safe for him, that his first time touching me was when we were comfortable for him.  He came up to me in the locker room and I had just gotten out of the shower after football practice and… He said he wanted to appreciate my body,” you laugh.  This is too far.  Further than you’ve ever been with another man, with somebody who counts on you so heavily.

Your breath is coming quicker, smaller pants as though you’ve been running for miles, and truthfully, you feel like you have.  You’re being put through the ringer here, and it’s starting to wear you out.  Fear is a factor, and you’re body is reacting accordingly.  You want to do nothing but curl up in your bed, hiding away from everything, because that’s the easy answer.  It’s what you’ve always done. 

You look anywhere but at Spencer, because you know that he’ll have compassion in those too expressive eyes.  And you know that he’ll want to take the burden of your pain.  But he carries his own, and you can’t give him everything just yet.  You’ll give him enough to show that you have confidence, that you want to move forward with him.  But you can’t give him your weight to bear, not without breaking him.  And you refuse to hurt something as beautifully pure as Spencer.

“You don’t have to go into details,” Spencer murmurs against your ear, and it’s soft and his breath is hot and you can’t stop the shiver of something that runs down your spine.  You can only pray to a God you don’t believe in anymore that he’ll linger just a little bit longer.  He won’t take the shiver as fear or disgust and move on somewhere without you.

“I didn’t know what was going on,” you whisper.  You lean your forehead into his shoulder and you breathe deeply, because you can’t look at him like this, not when you’re expected to be strong and brave and everything but what you are right now.  You can’t let him see you falling apart so completely.  “I thought I had to let him, because he’d done so much else for me.  And in the end, he took me out of juvie completely, and he helped me stay out of it.  I thought, if I didn’t let him do what he wanted to me, it would end up hurting me more than anything else.  I thought he would make me leave the youth center and I’d be forced to run for gangs again.  And I didn’t want that.” 

You’re rambling now, because you can’t focus on anything except for his long arms wrapped lovingly around you and his warm weight against your side.  You haven’t had a man this close to you in a long time. You know that you’re pushing yourself further than you’ve ever gone willingly, and you love Spencer, you trust him, but you’re scared too.  Because what he’s asking for, what he wants out of you is something you haven’t been able to give another person in years.  In more than a decade. 

He wants you vulnerable. 

Open and trusting. 

He wants to know the deepest and darkest parts of you. 

Please, you can only pray as long fingers trace the contours of your face.  Please don’t let this be a painful trick.  Please don’t let him be teasing you with the promise of more, the promise of a future with him.  You can’t take the joke.

Your eyes close as he traces the curve of your cheek bones.  Your hand clings to the long shirt he’s wearing, holding onto him, grounding yourself as you take this journey through your past, as you share with him intimately.  Giving him everything he’s asking for.  You’re supporting your relationship with him, giving him what he needs for this to be honest.  As deep and as real as you can make it.

“How were you going to be okay with me touching you sexually, if you hadn’t already dealt with this all?”

“I… I wouldn’t have let it get that far quickly.”

“Were you planning on telling me about what happened?  Or were you going to pretend that it didn’t happen to you?” Spencer asks softly.

And isn’t that an honest question?  One he has every right to ask you.  You know, as well as he does, that you probably would have never said anything about it, if you could‘ve helped it.  If he had pressed you about your hesitancy, you would have used your promiscuous behavior as an excuse, your uncertainty on how to please a man when you’ve been with so many women in the past.  And he wouldn’t have bought it, probably.  But you would have prayed it was enough.

You would never have gone down this road again, because it scares you.  And you know it scares him, because he doesn’t know how to be stronger than you.  At least, not physically.  And right now, when you’re floundering, when you’re wavering in pain and fear, you need him to be strong physically.  You need to be able to find peace with him, with his protection and his strength.

You don’t look at him, and he has probably already figured the answer out on his own.  He’s a genius, and it doesn’t take a genius to figure out what you’re going through, what’s in your head. 

Your shame is common in rape victims.

“Derek,” he whispers softly and you lift your eyes to look at his nose, unable to look at his eyes completely yet.  You failed him, his trust and his love for you.  Even if he hadn’t said it before tonight, you knew that it was there.  You knew that he had something for you, held a flame for you.  And in your shame, you would have laughed in his face.  You would have demeaned and belittled his gift and his love for you, because you wouldn’t have trusted him.  “Derek, you have to trust me.”

You close your eyes and lean forward, letting your forehead rest against his shoulder.  You close your mouth and you just cling to him, because really, you can do nothing else.  All you can do is hold on, and hope and pray that it’s enough for him.  You know he is so much more than you or others give him credit for.  He’s so strong, so powerful and beautiful and careful.  He knows so much about everything, about everyone, and yet he is so innocent and naïve.  “I’m scared, Spencer,” you admit softly. 

Because if nothing else, before he leaves you, you want him to know that you trust him.  You do.  But physical intimacy is another matter altogether.

“I know,” he answers.  His long arms wrap around you completely, his hands are splayed on your back, stroking and comforting as they move along your spine.  He is comforting you, protecting you from your own pain.  And isn’t that poignant and beautiful?  You wrap your arms around him and just cling.  Because there’s nothing else to do for him.  You want to be weak and you want to break and you want to hold him and let him hold you.

You shudder against him, and it’s almost too much for you to take.  How can you be with him like this, so close to him and yet so far from him?  How can you trust him so completely, and yet be so terrified of him?  How could you willingly hurt him so completely?

“The… the first time he… he did it, we were at his cabin.  Mom thought it would be a good idea.  She wanted me to get to know him better, because he was a good influence on me.  He would be able to help me learn the things that I needed to get out of the ghetto.  He got me drunk, Spence.  He told me that it was okay, that I was mature enough, and no matter what happened, he would be the only one who cared enough to be around.  And he made me believe him.  I believed him.

“I was scared.  I was so scared.  I didn’t want to go back to juvie.  I didn’t want to deal with the cops again.  And momma was so proud of me.  I was doing better in school.  Colleges were already interested in me because of football.  It was just a better situation all around.  I was fifteen Spence.  Fifteen the first time…”

“Hush,” Spencer murmurs against your ear.  His hand drags up your back and wraps around your neck, holding you close to his chest.  He presses light, chaste kisses to your temple, and it’s amazingly soft and gentle.  And you want so much to be able to just relax against him.  You want to let go and you want him to win, to protect you and comfort you and have you.  You want him to be your lover, and you want to be able to trust him enough that if he wanted to touch you, you’d be able to let him.  You don’t realize you’re crying until his soft fingers brush tears away from your eyes.  Softly, they trace your cheekbones, wiping away moisture that doesn’t belong there.

“Th-the only time I ever said no was after graduation, after I’d been accepted into a couple of colleges.  Because I knew that no matter what, he couldn’t make me do anything.  Because I knew I could go away to college and he wouldn’t be able to follow me there, not without making it look suspicious.  I told him… I told him that if he tried to touch me again I would tell whoever would listen.”

Your breath hitches. 

 _“Who are you going to tell?” Carl Buford asked, his hateful hands on his hips.  He looked like he wanted to laugh and he couldn’t quite hold it in.  “Who do you think is going to believe a former gang member?”_

 _“I wasn’t a gang member!  I just… I did what I had to,” you protested, looking away from him in aggravation._

 _Buford laughed, deep laughter before he approached you.  Before you could breath, his hands were around your body, holding you flush against him, trapping you.  You could feel the disgusting erection that pressed against you insistently.  He wants you to bend over and let your body take care of his physical pleasure.  And any time before, you would have.  It was your own fault for coming to the rec center today.  You didn’t need the football gear enough to risk this.  “Don’t lie to me, boy.  I know you like it.”_

 _“No.  No I don’t!” you cried, struggling against his hold on you.  He groaned at your movements and you want to die.  You knew that you were making him happy, touching him and teasing him like this, but you couldn’t stop.  It would be better to just be a dead weight, he’s never been interested in you when you don’t try to get away, when you don’t fight back._

 _His lips were on yours before you could blink and you felt yourself losing this fight.  He knew he was going to win when he walked into the rec center and saw you there.  Maybe you should have worn something less appealing.  Something that covered you completely?_

 _He turned you over and pushed you against the bench in the locker room, pressing your stomach painfully into the narrow wood.  Before you could breathe properly, he’d gotten you naked and has penetrated you.  With all the breath that you’ve got left in your body, you screamed.  It had never hurt so much, and you cling to the bench beneath you as he thrust into your body._

“Derek?” Spencer asks softly. 

His voice is careful, and his hands are safe.  He’s not going to tear into your body.  He’s not Buford.  And how you hate yourself for the slight comparison.  How on Earth could you have ever thought that this beautifully compassionate man was the bastard that stole your power?  How could you have ever been afraid of him?

Without thinking, you surge up and press your lips to his.  Because you know that you have to gain your courage if you’re going to make this thing work with him.  And you want to.  God above, you want to.  He kisses you back, and your lips move in sync with his lips.  Your tongue teases his lips and he pulls you closer to him, letting you tower over him, letting you have the power and the control and the strength.  He’s submitting to you, in the most important way you can conceive.

“I love you, Spencer.  I really do.  But I’m so scared,” you pant against his lips, urging your body to relax, to catch itself before you get into trouble.  Before this gets further than you’re willing to take it.  This isn’t the time for sexual intimacy, it would be bad if you went that route.  You would be giving Carl his victory.

His arms wrap around your neck tightly, and he clings to you, supporting your weight against his body as he leans into the couch.  His eyes are closed and he pulls you close, and you go willingly. 

Before you know it, you’ve collapsed against his chest and the tears are falling hard.  Hot and unceasing.  But it’s okay.  His long hands caress your back, stroke your spine and comfort you in ways that you hadn’t imagined.  You shudder in his arms and lean against him.  Relaxing, even as you cry hard for everything that you’ve been through.  For all of your pain, for all of your suffering.  You need to be with him, need his grace and his comfort. 

All you have are his arms around you and it’s enough. 

It’s _enough._

 _To be trusted is a greater compliment than being loved. ~George MacDonald_


End file.
